Montreal police are seeking Luka Rocco Magnotta, allegedly a stripper and porn star, in relation to Tuesday's discovery of a male torso in Montreal and a hand and foot from the torso mailed to OttawaHandout

Investigators on Wednesday identified Luka Rocco Magnotta as a suspect in the mysterious case of a dismembered torso found in Snowdon, and are asking for the public’s help to locate him.Courtesy of Montreal police

Building cleaner Mike Nadeau walks by the area behind his apartment building where he discovered the remains of a dismembered bodyPhil Carpenter
/ The Gazette

Building superintendent Eric Schorer and building cleaner Mike Nadeau walk by the area behind their apartment building where Nadeau discovered the remains of a dismembered bodyPhil Carpenter
/ The Gazette

Police were investigating the apartment building where a body was found inside a suitcase in the garbage. The tenant of the building is being sought by police. The mattress was stained with blood when a reporter walked in Wednesday afternoon.Phil Carpenter
/ The Gazette

Janitor Mike Nadeau shows police around the scene where a body was found in a suitcase at the back of 5309 Place Lucy in Montreal on Tuesday, May 29, 2012.Dave Sidaway
/ The Gazette

An Ottawa police officer removes an evidence bag after a suspicious package call at the Post Office main sorting terminal in Ottawa on Tuesday evening, May 29, 2012.Mike Carroccetto
/ The Ottawa Citizen

Ottawa police outside the Post Office main sorting terminal in Ottawa on Tuesday evening, May 29, 2012. There was a suspicious package call, and later, an evidence bag was taken from the premises.Mike Carroccetto
/ The Ottawa Citizen

Ottawa police outside the Post Office main sorting terminal in Ottawa on Tuesday evening, May 29, 2012. One officer has an evidence bag (obscured), which was taken from the premises.Mike Carroccetto
/ The Ottawa Citizen

An Ottawa police officer removes an evidence bag after a suspicious package call at the Post Office main sorting terminal in Ottawa on Tuesday evening, May 29, 2012.Mike Carroccetto
/ The Ottawa Citizen

The Conservative Party of Canada headquarters on Albert St., where Ottawa police were investigating the discovery of what appeared to be a human foot in a package mailed to the office.Jean Levac
/ Ottawa Citizen

Montreal police investigate after a janitor found a headless and limbless torso in a suitcase on Tuesday.Dave Sidaway
/ Dave Sidaway / THE GAZETTE

Police are investigating the discovery of a human foot in a package at the Conservative Party of Canada headquarters on Albert Street on Tuesday.

Ottawa police Sgt. Stephen Hodgson answers media questions in front of the Conservative Party of Canada’s headquarters Tuesday afternoon. Police were called to the office after an employee opened a package that contained what appeared to be a human foot and blood.Jean Levac
/ Ottawa Citizen

Sgt. Stephen Hodgson of the Ottawa Police answers media questions in front of the Conservative Party of Canada’s headquarter’s door. Police were called to the office after an employee opened a package that contained what appeared to be a human foot and blood.Jean Levac
/ Ottawa Citizen

Police and emergency crews were called to 130 Albert St. Tuesday afternoon after a worker at the Conservative Party of Canada headquarters opened a package that contained what appeared to be a human foot.Jean Levac
/ Ottawa Citizen

Reporters wait outside the Conservative Party of Canada headquarters on Albert St. as police investigate the discovery of what appeared to be a human foot in a package mailed to the office.Jean Levac
/ Ottawa Citizen

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MONTREAL – The search for Luka Rocco Magnotta — accused of murder after the grisly discovery of a torso whose severed foot and hand were mailed to the Conservative and Liberal Party offices in Ottawa - has extended around the world, after Interpol put the slaying suspect on its international list of wanted persons.

The alert from the international police organization came after a Canada-wide warrant had been issued Wednesday for Magnotta.

Thursday afternoon, a warrant for Magnotta’s arrest was issued at the Montreal courthouse. It accuses him of second-degree murder by causing the death “of an unknown person,” a Criminal Code charge that carries a life sentence upon conviction.

It is unusual for indictments to not identify the victims of a homicide, but in this case it appears Montreal police have an idea who the victim was but have yet to officially identify the remains. The victim’s family lives outside of Canada and investigators reportedly are having difficulty locating them.

Residents of the apartment building who were shown a photo of a man the police believe was the victim described him as an Asian man in his 30s.

In the warrant, Magnotta also is charged with committing an “indignity to the body of the human remains (of) an unknown person.”

Montreal police backtracked Thursday on claims they made this week that Magnotta had dated Karla Homolka, one of Canada’s most notorious sex killers. Police officials clarified Thursday that they were aware of the many rumours posted on the Internet, but had no proof to substantiate those stories. In 2007, Magnotta came forward to news media in 2007 to deny that he had dated her, although many at the time suggested he was the one who started the rumours, to gain attention.

Late Wednesday, CTV News reported that a note had been found in the box containing the severed foot. The note allegedly said that a total of six body parts had been distributed through the mail, and warned that the person responsible would kill again.

A video purporting to show Magnotta stabbing a man repeatedly on a bed has been circulating online and was sent to The Gazette. The Gazette has been unable to confirm that this is the same video that police received. The Gazette has not been able to confirm whether the video was staged.

Police have obtained a disturbing video of the crime and are taking steps to have it removed from a website where it was posted, The Gazette has confirmed.

“We really need the public’s help on this,” said SPVM spokesman Ian Lafrenière. The assistance of residents in the area where the body was discovered had also helped the investigation advance quickly.

Magnotta is said to be a stripper and a porn star. The suspect was not previously known to police, Lafrenière said.

A headless, limbless torso was discovered in a suitcase with a heap of garbage Tuesday at Place Lucy and Decarie Blvd. in Montreal’s Snowdon neighbourhood. About the same time Tuesday, an employee of Conservative Party of Canada headquarters in Ottawa opened a package that contained a severed foot. A second parcel containing a hand was later located at a Canada Post sorting facility in Ottawa.

Wednesday, police linked the severed appendages to the torso and transferred the case to Montreal police.

Montreal police focused their attention on a second floor apartment in a building on Décarie near where the torso was found Tuesday in a suitcase on the curb with a pile of garbage.

The tenant of the building is being sought by police, said residents of the building.

The apartment smelled terrible and it appears the homicide was carried out on a bed in the small apartment. A reporter saw a mattress stained with blood Wednesday afternoon.

Residents also said police believe the torso belongs to an Asian man who is apparently missing. The police have been showing them a photo of the Asian man on Wednesday.

Residents described Magnotta as a very quiet man who kept to himself. The building's superintendant joked about it.

"It's like you see in the movies. It's always the good neighbour. It's the cliché," he said.

Residents of the building said they believe Magnotta worked in the gay porn industry.

One said the only time Magnotta spoke to him was about five days ago. He asked the man, an actor, how he could get started in "legitimate" movies.

Residents of the building said they also saw Magnotta wearing a bizarre wig days ago and that they commented on his strange appearance.

Employees at a Canada Post office just a few blocks away from where the suspect lives said the police have not questioned them about the possibility of body parts being mailed from their location. Both employees were aware that a torso had been found near their location. But they said no one had asked them about the case until two reporters asked them about the strange story Wednesday afternoon.

Magnotta has also been the subject of an international social media campaign for allegedly killing kittens, videotaping their deaths and posting the videos online.

Animal rights activists around the world mobilized to identify him and offered a $5,000 to bring him to justice. The online efforts to find him may have fuelled some of Magnotta’s online writings defending his reputation and complaining about “cyber stalking” and “media propaganda” on his website www.Luka-Magnotta.net.

“I do not feel the necessity to address the specific accusations made in the posts since they are so far from my character that responding to them will give them more credibility than they will ever hold. If the readers of these posts can look behind the storyline that has been created, they will see that there is no reference to a concrete transaction or event that has taken place with any specific person in which I have committed any illegal activity,” he wrote on one of his eponymous websites.

“Many hoax websites are created using my image and name, posing as me to seem more believable in respect to the type of audience these websites have, I feel I don’t need to list them specifically but people need to be told not to believe what they read and to take it as fact,” he wrote in one article titled “Cyber Stalking” beside a photo of him shirtless and reclining.

Police have not released the victim’s name. An autopsy is expected to reveal how the man was killed and whether he was dead before being dismembered, police said.

The Gazette's Jan Ravensbergen, Canadian Press and the Ottawa Citizen contributed to this report.

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